February 1/99 11:09 am - Tour de Langkawi, Sponsors Bail, Birthdays

Jacques Landry has promised to report back to us every day on the Tour of Langkawi - he is managing the Canadian team. The race starts on Wednesday, but Jacques has just sent in his first report.

Well,

All the team has arrived safe and sound with just a few complications with Sylvain Beauchamp's flight. As usual, the Tour de Langkawi organization took us under their wings and made sure every thing was under control upon our arrival. It is now 2 days from the initial start of this 11 day stage race and the troops are ready to go. Canada has selected for this year's edition a pretty homogeneous bunch of riders with Sylvain Beauchamp, Rodney Henderson, Czeslaw Lukaszewicz, Dominique Perras, Andrew Randell and Eric Wolhberg (leading the group as team captain).

The team lineups seem to have the same type of depth as the last 2 years, with the strongest team on paper being Mapei. In addition, there are a few other teams that should give us a good run for our money. Among them, there are the Navigare, Cantina Tollo, Agro Adler, Mroz, Accept Card and Saturn teams, to name a few.

The first stage is the prologue on Feb. 3rd, followed by a 50km criterium in the afternoon. I know for the prologue I'm putting my bets on Eric Wohlberg who's always done well in this event, with a 4th place last year and a win in 97.

In any case, we're going to be racing this stage race one day at a time, but wouldn't it be good to start this thing on the right foot???

Until next time...

Jacques Landry

Team Sponsors Pull Out

We just heard from Anne Samplonius that the title sponsors of her Hydro Quebec-Quebec Tourism team have pulled out, leaving the riders in dire straits. Other riders suddenly left teamless include Petra Rossner and Ina Teutenberg of Germany. Further fallout from the sponsor bailout could include the demise of the Montreal Women's World Cup (these companies were also sponsors of that event). We will keep you posted as we find out more.